“Too much,” he whined, and I pulled out as carefully as I could with the little coordination I had.
I wobble-crawled up to the pillows and plopped down next to Bear who was equally breathless.
He rolled over toward me and attached himself to my side, head on my chest. “That was….”
“Yeah.” Then I chuckled. “I just changed the sheets. I think we need to change them again before tonight.”
“I feel like I should get haircuts more often.”
I snorted, then started to laugh, and gathered him impossibly closer. We had a few minutes before the sticky situation would become too sticky, and I wanted to feel him close as the sweat and cum dried on our skin.
I wanted to ask if I’d hurt his hip, but I decided against it. The moment was too good to interrupt, he’d had his safe word, and he didn’t deserve to be treated like a fragile thing because he was anything but. Besides, he was healed, I was pretty sure, if not completely like before the accident, then up to a point he could. I trusted him to be a conscientious adult about these things.
Later, while we lazily washed each other in the shower, he asked, “So, how was Europe?” and we bust out laughing together.
That did remind me though… “Hey, there’s presents.”
He glanced at himself and then at me, deemed us suds free and practically jumped out of the shower.
“Dry yourself, you menace. The first bag is in your room, I put it under your bed.”
He whirled around and almost got tangled in his towel. “Firstbag?”
“Yeah, there’s other stuff too, but that’s the one that’ll make you squeal the loudest.”
To Bear’s credit, he did manage to somewhat dry himself, and yes, I’m pretty sure our neighbors heard him when he realized what was in the bag.
He ran into the bedroom, wearing only a Clarissa T-shirt and holding onto the pile of other stuff.
“I’d take your picture and send it to her, but your dick is hanging out.”
Completely missing my point, his eyes widened comically. “You have hernumber?”
A few days after I came home, I finally started the rose tattoo on his hip. It took a couple of hours to outline it to the degree I wanted, because I was being as careful with it as I’d ever been. It would cover his hip and the side of his butt, and at one point of the process, when he hissed in a way that wasn’t completely bad kind of pain, I smirked at him.
“Oh hush.” He stuck out his tongue at me. Then he seemed to remember something. “Hey, did you hear about the Carl thing yet?”
I nodded, trying to keep my expression from revealing anything. “I heard.” I frowned as I leaned even closer to his skin, and murmured, “Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”
A big part of me wanted to ask Iris if she’d made this happen, but I decided that it would be too risky for both of us. Instead, I decided to revel in the knowledge that some karma had arrived at that asshole’s doorstep.
“You don’t have to seem so pleased about it,” Bear said, grinning a little.
“Oh trust me, I do.” I looked at him and lifted my hand. “I didn’t know it then, but he touched something that was mine. He made someone I love feel miserable after promising them things he was never going to honor. He deserves everything that happens to him.”
Something in Bear’s sharp gaze sharpened even further. I saw the question on the tip of his tongue. In the end, he nodded, closed his eyes, and relaxed into the chair.
He didn’t want to know if I’d had something to do with it. Even if he suspected, he wouldn’t ask. I was glad, because I would never lie to him, and some things he just didn’t need to know for his own safety.
Allen, on the other hand, was a whole other case. We’d gone for a drink at his club last night, Allen and I, and he’d not asked, either. The difference with him was that somehow, he knew. But he also condoned whatever I’d done, because if he’d thought of it, I had no doubt he wouldn’t have done it himself.
“I considered calling some shadier old acquaintances,” he’d confessed after his second drink. He didn’t elaborate, nor did he need to.
He asked about Bear’s working situation, and I explained to him what Bear had done while I was away.
“I would’ve asked him myself, but you’re here now,” Allen said, smiling a little. “Do you think he’d want to work for me and the others? Do marketing and all that internet whatever thing for the club?”
“I don’t see why not.” I finished my second beer and decided I was done. “Are you changing things around?”
